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wonkaworldwide · 1 year

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Can Wonka (2023) beat Charlie and the Chocolate Factory at the box office?

We’re about a year out from the release of Wonka. The upcoming 2023 film, directed by Paul King and starring Timothée Chalamet as Willy Wonka, will be the third film in the Wonkaverse™, following 1971′s Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory and 2005′s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

I’m not here to discuss whether or not the 2023 film will be a quality movie—I’m almost certain it will be. I’m here to discuss money. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was obviously a huge hit in 2005, becoming the eighth-highest-grossing film worldwide in that year. Charlie’s $474 million gross is extremely admirable, but $474 million doesn’t make it unbeatable. It’s within striking range of what the 2023 film could do. The question is: can Wonka beat Charlie and the Chocolate Factory at the box office? I’ll be looking at several reasons going for it and going against it.

The Roald Dahl curse

When Netflix acquired the Roald Dahl catalog in 2021, Forbes’ Scott Mendelson described the acquisition as a “huge risk”. Why? Well, Roald Dahl’s films haven’t historically done well at the box office. With the obvious exception of Tim Burton’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl film adaptations are almost always a financial failure.

Not a single Roald Dahl adaptation (sans Charlie) has grossed more than double its budget. On paper, Steven Spielberg’s The BFG may look like it made some money, but if you take into account the advertising and marketing costs, it ended up being one of Spielberg’s only “money-losing mega-flops” (see the above Forbes article). Financial information is largely unavailable on 2020′s The Witches, but considering it went straight to HBO Max during the pandemic and received disastrous reviews from critics, I think it’s safe to say that film was not one of Dahl’s successes.

Again, financial success does not correlate to critical success, as almost all of Dahl’s adaptations have become cult classics, and the only mega-blockbuster is probably the most divisive film adaptation of the bunch. However, I agree with Forbes that pursuing any Roald Dahl adaptation nowadays is a big risk.

However, the magic that Charlie and the Chocolate Factory had is (arguably) star power. Any Johnny Depp/Tim Burton collaboration in the mid-2000s was a license to print money. Now, Paul King isn’t a household name, mainly because he hasn’t done much outside of those two Paddington movies. Timothée Chalamet, however, is a household name, and his loyal army of young supporters does bear a resemblance to the following Depp had in the 2000s.

It also helps the 2023 film’s prospects that Willy Wonka is by far the most iconic and recognizable Roald Dahl property, and that the 1971′s financial underperformance could be considered a fluke since it was released more than fifty years ago when moviegoing in general was vastly different. This was years before summer movies were considered a thing. Wonka will be the definitive factor as to whether or not the Willy Wonka property is the one exception to the Roald Dahl curse, or if Charlie and the Chocolate Factory alone is the exception.

Releasing a candy-themed movie in Winter (and competition)

I’ll preempt this by saying that it’s entirely possible that Wonka may succumb to a shuffle in Warner Bros. release lineup. Preferably, that would result in the movie being released sooner rather than later, but November sees the release of Dune: Part Two and two back-to-back Chamalet films seem unlikely.

Wonka (coming December 15, 2023) is the first Wonka movie to be released in December, as Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory was released in June and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was released in July. This seems like a no-brainer and will most likely help the film rather than hurt it. There are all kinds of snowy environments (from what we’ve seen from the on-location shooting) and any movie about candy will be a perfect Christmas film.

It’s easy to look at Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’s box office and say that it’s a safe bet to release a movie like this in summer, but the truth is that the summer of 2005 wasn't a summer populated with hits. July 2005 saw the release of Fantastic Four... Sky High... uh... March of the Penguins... and that's it as far as movies that kids would have any interest in seeing (unless there was some awesome kid out there eagerly awaiting The Devils Rejects). In fact, July 2005 was such an underwhelming month for kids movies that Charlie’s main competition for it’s opening weekend was considered to be the release of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (the book, not the movie). That’s right, there were a handful of people that just didn't go to the theaters that weekend because they were reading.

But speaking of competition, let’s look at the movies that are coming out the same weekend as Wonka...

Oh... there aren’t any...

Yeah, it’s probably because we’re still twelve months out, but Wonka is the only movie scheduled for the first nineteen days of December 2023. Obviously, this isn’t going to stay the same, so we’ll just have to see what movies Wonka has to face against in its opening weekend. December 20th sees the release of The Color Purple, which is also a musical. It’s too early to say what age group it’ll be aiming for, but considering the first movie was PG-13 and the story is so profound, I’d imagine there will be families seeing it. December 20th also sees the release of the next Ghostbusters movie, which is an odd choice because I’ve always associated Ghostbusters with autumn and halloween, but whatever. This, to me, poses the strongest competition to Wonka of all the December releases on the calendar so far. It’s releasing only five days after Wonka, and I think once Ghostbusters hits theaters, the kids are going to dig the adventure and spookiness, and Ghostbusters will be the go-to movie for families after December 20th. But more on what kids will be looking for in Wonka later...

Appeal to children

Or actually, more on that now! This one may not spring to mind for most people, but as someone who was five years old when Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was released, I remember the movie being sold to me on the appeal of the child characters. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory had a pretty great marketing campaign that emphasized each of the nasty children. As a kid, I thought the kids were the highlight of the film. Wonka wasn’t a character I appreciated until I got older.

I mention this because Wonka most likely won’t have child characters as iconic as the previous two iterations, and part of me wonders if a kid is going to see the promotional material for Wonka and beg their parents to see it.

The chocolate factory was also an appealing aspect to 5-year-old me. A chocolate waterfall with a pink boat, a room with squirrels, the glass elevator passing by room after room of dream-like gadgetry... Obviously, because this is a prequel, there will most likely be very little of the chocolate factory in the movie, and they won’t be used in the marketing because they wouldn’t want to spoil the end. Now because it is a Willy Wonka movie, there’s going to be some kind of magic-like candy environments (we know they are going to Loompaland), even though it won’t be the factory itself. We don’t know anything about what the movie has shot on soundstages, but one can imagine it’s absolutely more magical than the on-location shooting they were doing in dour Londontown.

How much it appeals to children is one aspect of the project that I can’t really judge it on because there hasn’t been a trailer yet. I will say that, beyond the child characters and the factory, the trailers need to have a tone that looks fun. Wonka so far looks smart and it looks sentimental, which means it’s skewing close to the 70s film. There needs to be some wackiness, some adventure and some pure childish fun—all things that the Tim Burton movie got across very well in it’s advertising—to make Wonka a movie that kids will drag their parents to, and not the other way around.

What? A Willy Wonka prequel? Can’t Hollywood get some new ideas blah blah blah

Even though there have only been two Willy Wonka movies over the last fifty years, people somehow have it in their minds that the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory franchise is one that Hollywood continually pillages. I mean, there have been 25 James Bond movies in roughly the same amount of time.

However, a major hurdle that Wonka will have to deal with is perception. Most people are going to say to themselves “Why are they making a Willy Wonka prequel? Who asked for this?” Admit it, you were saying this yourself before you learned about the movie’s exceptional cast and crew (heck, you may still be saying it). The public nowadays is very keen to the notion that Hollywood pillages every franchise it can lay it’s hands on, with Disney’s endless barrage of remakes, prequels, and legacy sequels being the most prominent example. The advertisers of Wonka are going to have a challenge convincing the public that this a story worth telling and worth seeing, and not just a soulless studio attempt at making a buck off the Willy Wonka name.

Of course, the film’s marketing hasn’t even begun. Once people see some images and hear some songs, things may change, but if I were to gauge public sentiment towards Wonka right now, I would say it looks pretty unfavorable for the movie. Critics seem more optimistic than the general public, but that’s mainly because Paul King is well known among critics but not so much among Joe Public.

However, Wonka can overcome this because Charlie and the Chocolate Factory overcame this. Charlie faced a great deal of hostility prior to its release, from people refusing to give the movie a chance because they held the 1971 film in high regard. Tim Burton himself commented on this in June 2005: “The way people talk, it’s like we’re taking copies of the cold movie and burning them so no one can ever see them again.” And despite the die-hard 1971 fans who refused to watch any Willy Wonka that wasn’t Gene Wilder, Charlie went on to become the 58th highest-grossing-film of all time at it’s time of release, and a whole generation of children grew up with it and consider it their preferred version of the tale. I’ve never been so proud.

Wonka has the ability to do just this, become a hit and become the preferred version of story for a generation of children, and piss a bunch of people who grew up on the previous two adaptations (although I hope 2005 fans are more keen to welcome it into the Wonka family).

The quality of the movie itself

Yeah, my final point is that Wonka’s box office performance will be impacted by just how good it is. The public isn’t particularly looking forward to another Willy Wonka movie, but if they hear it’s really good, like really good, then people will flock towards it. This is comparable to Top Gun earlier this year. To me, it seemed like there was absolutely no hype for this movie whatsoever, but it gained popularity just because of how good it was (haven't seen it so I can’t confirm this). I knew people who went and saw it without seeing the first Top Gun.

Paul King obviously has a great track record with family films, with his Paddington movies averaging at 98% on Rotten Tomatoes—compare this to Willy Wonka’s 91% and Charlie’s 83%. This alone shows that King is capable of making a Willy Wonka film is not only good, but that could unseat both versions as being the definitive Willy Wonka film, as both Charlie and Willy Wonka have their own problems: the 1971 film being dated in several areas and having some serious pacing issues, and the 2005 film exploring Wonka’s upbringing in a polarizing way.

However, it’s also possible that the movie FUCKING SUCKS!!!1!!! I’ll use Tim Burton as an example: he had a nearly flawless filmography in the 1980s and 1990s. Honestly, try to find a bad film among the following: Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, Beetlejuice, Batman, Batman Returns, Edward Scissorhands, Ed Wood, Mars Attacks!, Sleepy Hollow. And then in 2001 he did Planet of the Apes, which was not only his worst movie at the time, but a frequent contender for worst movie of the year and won the Razzie for Worst Remake. Thankfully, Burton redeemed himself immediately after with four consecutive bangers: Big Fish, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Corpse Bride, and Sweeney Todd.

(This may be a bad example because Planet of the Apes was still the ninth-highest-grossing film of 2001, and therefore it’s negative reception didn’t affect it’s box office gross...)

It’s difficult to assess Paul King overall as a director, because while he’s done arguably the two most acclaimed family films of the 21st century, he hasn’t really done anything outside of the Paddington films to further prove his filmmaking prowess. He did a movie in 2009 called Bunny and the Bull, which has a 6.6 on IMDB, a 3.3/5 on Letterboxd, a 67% critics score and a 65% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes—every metric indicating that it’s pretty decent but nowhere near Paddington.

The soundtrack alone could be enough to boost Wonka to become a hit, considering the previous two films have fantastic soundtracks. The (Academy Award-nominated) 1971 soundtrack has since become ingrained into pop culture, and the (Grammy-nominated) 2005 soundtrack has some of Danny Elfman’s best compositions. The 2023 film’s music will be composed by Neil Hannon of The Divine Comedy. I’d be lying if I said I’ve ever heard any of his stuff, but he’s a more inspired choice than your usual Hans Zimmer or Alexandre Desplat or whoever (I don’t know who the go-to-guy for musicals would be).

So will Wonka beat Charlie at the box office?

Looking at all the facts, Wonka faces an uphill challenge. Ultimately, no, I do not believe that Wonka will make more money than Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I expect Wonka to have a lower budget, so there’s a good chance that it will be more profitable than Charlie, but I’m anticipating that Wonka ends up somewhere in the $300–$400 million range.

I do think that Wonka will be the second-highest grossing Roald Dahl film and the second exception to the Roald Dahl curse. And I just think to myself, if Mary Poppins Returns (a movie truly no-one was asking for) could make $350 million in 2019, then Wonka could do just as much. And the Willy Wonka property is far more relevant and in-demand than Mary Poppins. So here it is:

Wonka (2023): Prediction as of December 4, 2022

Worldwide gross: $350 million

Rotten Tomatoes: 84% critics, 68% audience

Trust me, I want this movie to do well. Peter Ostrum, the original Charlie Bucket, said something absolutely true, that any Wonka project reignites interest in all the other Wonka projects. So yeah, I’d love to see Wonka do well and there be a huge surge in popularity for the other two movies.

Anyway, thank you so much for reading! I realize I’ve kinda abandoned my Tumblr in favor of posting more frequently on my Twitter, but I want to begin using my Tumblr for more editorial style posts like this, offering my thoughts on any aspect on the Wonka world in general.

#Charlie and the Chocolate Factory #Wonka #Tim Burton #Paul King #timothée chalamet #Willy Wonka #Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory

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dorothydalmati1 · 8 months

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Obscure Animation Subject #40: Neighbors from Hell

Originally posted on Twitter on March 19, 2023.

Created by Pam Brady, written by Paul Alexander and Paul Mendelson and directed by John Rice and Raymond S. Persi, it is produced by Wounded Poodle, DreamWorks (credited as MoonBoy) and 20th Century Fox Television.

It aired for one season of 10 episodes from June 7 to July 26, 2010, the first episode aired on Cartoon Network via the Adult Swim programming block while the rest aired on TBS. Animation is mainly produced by Bardel Entertainment, though retakes are done by Bento Box.

It should be noted that this is the first production to have involvement from Bento Box Entertainment, a then-new studio founded in 2009 by executive producers Scott Greenberg, Joel Kuwahara and Mark McJimsey, and would later be known for producing Bob's Burgers for Fox.

This show is about a family from hell being sent back to earth on a mission to destroy a drill that can dig to the Earth's core where Satan fears that the humans will invade Hell if the drill reaches it. Sounds interesting and action-packed in concept, but in execution, well, this acts like yet another GENERIC FAMILY SITCOM! We have the idiot father, drinking wife, a daughter who wants attention and the son, well he’s just like his dad. Oh yeah, we also have a talking dog because Family Guy also had one! Oh god when do these Family Guy clones end?!

The comedy (while there are occasional laughs) is rather sour as well, with forced and cliche jokes, and the animation, which while not copying Family Guy, is mediocre and rather stiff. It’s formulaic and unfunny and I recommend skipping this one. Huge wasted potential!

#Neighbors from Hell #obscure animation

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liliannasprereadmediathek · 10 months

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Little Women (1994/2019) Part 3 is now LIVE

We’ve reached the final part of our trilogy on Little Women, and the time has come to say good-bye to the March sisters and co… But not before we’ve thoroughly discussed these adaptations one last time!

So join us once more as we examine how the two films treat their male love-interests, how Gerwig reimagines the concept of the ‘family’, and as we question who, or what, we should be directing our criticisms towards when we critique these movies.

Can Little Women be a ‘story for every generation’? Or is this the wrong question?

To hear our views, hit the link in our bio, or find us on all good podcasting apps 🎧 [headphones emoji]

🍂🍁📚🎄🍃🌳❄️☃️📜✍️🪶

[falling autumn leaves emoji; leaf emoji; stack of books emoji; Christmas tree emoji; falling green leaves emoji; tree emoji; snowflake emoji; snowman emoji; scroll emoji; handwriting emoji; feather emoji]

📝 Shownotes: 📝

📼 Preread text (Rowan Ellis, https://youtu.be/SMFll3aIbmo)

Primary Sources:

📚 “Little Women” (1868, 1869) by Louisa May Alcott 🎞️ “Little Women” (1933) (dir. George Cukor, 📜 Sarah Y. Mason and Victor Heerman) 🎞️ “Little Women” (1949) (dir. Mervyn LeRoy, 📜 Andrew Solt, Sarah Y. Mason, Victor Heerman) 🎞️ “Little Women” (1994) (dir. Gillian Armstrong, 📜 Robin Swicord) 🎞️ “Little Women” (2019) (dir. + 📜 Greta Gerwig) (https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/little-women-by-greta-gerwig.pdf) 📺 “Little Women” (2017) (dir. Vanessa Caswill, 📜 Heidi Thomas) (Masterpiece: PBS)

Secondary Sources:

📰 “Life Magazine: Little Women: A Story for Every Generation” (Meredith Corp., 2020)

📜 Amatonormativity (https://medium.com/the-science-scholar/opinion-amatonormativity-the-damaging-pedestal-of-romantic-love-d70cc0585b0f) 📜 Grady, Constance, “The power of Greta Gerwig’s Little Women is that it doesn’t pretend its marriages are romantic” (https://www.vox.com/culture/2019/12/27/21037870/little-women-greta-gerwig-ending-jo-laurie-amy-bhaer) 📜Nicolaou, Elena, “Why Greta Gerwig's Little Women Movie Radically Changed the Book's Ending” (https://www.oprahdaily.com/entertainment/a30186941/little-women-ending/) 📜 Mendelson, Scott, “Box Office: Greta Gerwig’s ‘Little Women’ Tops $100M” (https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2020/02/06/box-office-little-women-tops-100-million-greta-gerwig-saoirse-ronan-florence-pugh-oscars/) 📼 “Little Women: Laurie & Jo” (https://youtu.be/osdVRusNGgg) 🎞️ “Divergent” (2014) (dir. Neil Burger, 📜 Evan Daugherty, Vanessa Taylor) 📼 “Greta Gerwig, Representation, and the Universal Girl” (https://youtu.be/0p-cBSqIDbQ) 📼 “Why Neurodivergent People Relate to Jo March” (https://youtu.be/x-j5XK1wpyo) 📼 “How I Wrote Little Women — Greta Gerwig's Writing Advice” (https://youtu.be/vG906HuUz38)

📱Social Media Handles📱:

IG: @liliannapod Twitter: @liliannapod Tumblr: @liliannasprereadmediathek

🎹 Intro Music 🎹: "Wall" by Jahzaar, licenced under Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0)

🎹 Outro Music 🎹: “Waterbeat” by DJ Lengua, licenced under Attribution 3.0 Unported (CC BY 3.0)

🎹 Transition Music 🎹:

“Warm Piano Logo” by Music_For_Videos – Pixabay

#LittleWomen #LouisaMayAlcott #JoMarch #AmyMarch #BethMarch #MegMarch #Laurie #GretaGerwig #Barbie #BarbieMovie #SaoirseRonan #EmmaWatson #FlorencePugh #ElizaScanlen #LauraDern #TimothéeChalamet #BobOdenkirk #GillianArmstrong #SusanSarandon #WinonaRyder #KirstenDunst #ClaireDanes #ChristianBale #MoviePodcast #podcast #queer #FeministPodcast #QueerPodcast #LiliAnnasPrereadMediathek #LiliAnnaPod

#trans #ace #DisabledRepresentation #DisabledRep #disability #disabled

#MerylStreep #AdaptationTheory

#Spotify

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sebastianshaw · 1 year

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Shaw’s nightmare!

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wornoutspines · 1 year

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Secret Invasion | Trailer 2

Not a lot of new images in the new #SecretInvasion trailer but it's still showing stuff. #Marvel #MCU #SamuelLJackson

Creator: Kyle Bradstreet Stars: Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Mendelson, Emilia Clarke, Olivia Colman, Cobie Smulders, Martin Freeman, Don Cheadle, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Killian Scott, Dermot Mulroney, Christopher McDonald, and Carmen Ejogo. If you’re interested in the source material, help us by getting them from the link below: Secret Invasion by Brian Michael Bendis, Illustrated by Leinil Francis Yu

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publictaknews · 1 year

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American journalist calls Shah Rukh Khan 'India's Tom Cruise' in article, fans furious

The global success of Shah Rukh Khan’s Pathan has attracted the attention of international critics as well. The Hindi action film has broken box-office records worldwide and domestically. American journalist and critic, Scott Mendelson referred to Shah Rukh as India’s Tom Cruise in an article, angering his fans who asked him to amend his piece. The Top Gun: The maverick star started trending…

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#American #article #calls #cruise #fans #furious #Indias #journalist #Khan #Rukh #Shah #Tom

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futuristicallytoocollectorworld · 1 year

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vimeo

Apartments.com "2D Ted" from a52 on Vimeo.

Client: Apartments.com Agency: RPA

Chief Creative Officer: Joe Baratelli Executive Creative Director: Pat Mendelson Creative Directors: Hobart Birmingham, Perrin Anderson Associate Creative Directors: Erin Costello, Jeff St. Jean Art Director: Rik Patenaude Copywriter: Scott Ellman Junior Art Director: Ashley Cardwell Junior Copywriter: Nick Vukasovich Associate Producer: Madi Miller Executive Producer: Kay Lynn Dutcher SVP / Director, Video Production: Selena Pizarro ____________________________________________________________________________

LIVE ACTION Production Company: Hungry Man Director: Wayne McClammy Director of Photography: Bryan Newman Producer: Rick Jarjoura Production Supervisor: Yuki Wakano Production Designer: Robb Buono Executive Producer: Caleb Dewart Managing Partner / Executive Producer: Mino Jarjoura ____________________________________________________________________________ VFX VFX Studio: a52 VFX Supervisor: Andres Rafael Barrios CG Supervisor: Andrew Romatz Art Director: EJ Kang Lead Flame Artist: Steve Wolff Flame Artists: Richard Hirst, Michael Vaglienty, Chris Riley, Kirk Balden, Hugh Seville, Rod Basham, Richie White 3D Artists: Ariana Ziae Mohseni, Dustin Mellum, Jaemin Lee, Andrew Wilson, Bryan Cox, Josh Dyer, Jade Smrz, José Limón, Michael Cardenas, Jun Kim Matte Painters: Jie Zhou, Whitman Lindstrom Designers: June Cho, Tnaya Witmer Animators: James Hurlburt, Mark Feldman, Haram Jung, Laura Reedy, Trix Taylor Concept Artist: Marc Samson Producer: Jillian Lynes Production Coordinators: Sara Dotson, Shane Hoffman Head of Production: Stacy Kessler-Aungst Head of CG Production: Michael Steinmann Executive Producers: Patrick Nugent & Kim Christensen Managing Director: Jennifer Sofio Hall ____________________________________________________________________________

COLOR Color Studio: CO3 Los Angeles Colorist: Sean Coleman Color Producer: Matt Moran _________________________________________________________________________ EDITORIAL Editorial Company: Cut+Run Editor: Steve Gandolfi Assistant Editor: Moss Eletreby Producer: Jared Thomas ____________________________________________________________________________ SOUND Sound Mix: Lime

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outnowpodcast · 2 years

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Out Now Commentary: @TopGunMovie (1986) with guests @brandon4kuhd, @yancyberns, @pajamo & Scott Mendelson. I feel the need, the need for speed! (Link in the bio.) #TopGun #TomCruise #ValKilmer #AnthonyEdwards #KellyMcGillis #DangerZone #TonyScott #May2022 #commentary #movie #film #podcast #podcaster #podcastersofinstagram #podcastlife #outnowwithaaronandabe https://www.instagram.com/p/CeFj-1vr0Mn/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

#topgun #tomcruise #valkilmer #anthonyedwards #kellymcgillis #dangerzone #tonyscott #may2022 #commentary #movie #film #podcast #podcaster #podcastersofinstagram #podcastlife #outnowwithaaronandabe

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outfitandtrend · 2 years

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[ad_1] On March 25th, Everything Everywhere All at Once opened on 10 screens in a few major North American markets where it performed spectacularly well, grossing over a half-million dollars and earning a per-screen average of over $50,000. (As a point of comparison, that same week’s box office champ, The Lost City, earned a little over $7000 per screen.) This was not particularly surprising. A wildly inventive family drama in the form of a multiverse-spanning action film filled with bizarre ideas and thrillingly staged martial arts action sequences, Everything Everywhere All at Once had all the makings of an arthouse hit even before it arrived in theaters, earning strong reviews and benefitting from an intriguing marketing campaign from distributor A24, no stranger to making arthouse hits. Nor was it surprising that the film would continue to find more success as its run expanded.What is surprising is just how much success it would find. The film will almost certainly cross the $50 million mark this weekend in a run that has yet to experience a dramatic drop-off or even a definitive tapering off. In fact, Everything Everywhere All at Once added theaters last week as it dropped a mere 6%. In short, it’s performed extraordinarily well—and it’s not done.Just how well? Scott Mendelson, who covers film and box office results for Forbes, puts it in perspective by noting that “when it hits the $52 million mark it will outgross House of Gucci at the domestic box office. That means it will have made more than any of last year’s Oscar-season awards releases, except for Dune.” That means it’s blown past films directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, Guillermo del Toro and Steven Spielberg, big (if admittedly underperforming) studio releases with big studio marketing campaigns that arrived in theaters in the midst of the movie-friendly holiday season.So what accounts for the success of Everything Everywhere All at Once? It’s tough to pin down and, despite the advantages of good reviews and a canny distributor, the film’s performance defies conventional wisdom. It’s not part of a franchise. Star Michelle Yeoh first found fame in the Hong Kong film industry in the ‘80s and ‘90s. She’s known and loved by many in the West thanks to films like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Crazy Rich Asians, but her name isn’t a box office draw. Co-star Ke Huy Quan did appear in some huge hits, but as a child star back in the ’80s when he could be found in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and The Goonies. Set across the personal parallel universes of Evelyn (Yeoh), a laundromat owner in a strained marriage who has trouble connecting with her daughter Joy (Stephanie Hsu), the plot resists easy description. The tone veers from darkly comedic to unabashedly sentimental (touching all points in between). The previous feature co-directed by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, a team collectively known as “Daniels,” Swiss Army Man, was warmly received but didn’t make them household names. And though Everything Everywhere All at Once is wildly entertaining it’s also demanding, maintaining a frenetic pace for much of its 139 minute running time. “It's certainly not,” Mendelson says, “a film that's intended to be watched while you are doing chores or playing on your phone.”It’s also an extremely personal film, in spite of scenes with sentient rocks and wild martial arts sequences. Kwan has described the film as both an attempt to understand and forgive his parents and as a key to recognizing his previously undiagnosed ADHD. The gulf in understanding between first- and second-generation Asian-Americans is central to its narrative. The flitting from place to place, tone to tone, and dimension to dimension is a reflection of ADHD. “I’m hoping that this film could be part of that kind of awareness, the movement of awareness around that particular mental illness or handicap,” Kwan recently told The Verge. [ad_2] Source link

#FASHIONFORMEN

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